


My Only Sunshine

by CluelessKitten



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Gen, Hydra Steve Rogers, Identity Issues, Littleverse, Mental Instability, Permanent Injury, Tony is a Little, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-11-21
Updated: 2019-11-21
Packaged: 2021-02-18 06:47:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,128
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21506869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CluelessKitten/pseuds/CluelessKitten
Summary: The Commander is all that's left of Steve Rogers. When a mission goes wrong and he comes face-to-face with an injured but very much alive Tony Stark, he resolves never to let the universe take away his Little again.
Comments: 3
Kudos: 47





	My Only Sunshine

**Author's Note:**

> I have a fondness for writing unhinged!Steve. I guess that can count as a warning of sorts, for anyone who's not into that sort of thing.
> 
> Also, consider this my attempt to write a LittleVerse without actually using 'little' in that sense. I managed to limit it to at least just once a chapter.

It’s a long time before he sees their manipulation, and by then, it’s too late.

The Commander’s steady footfalls come to a stop mere meters away from the prize. He’s been waiting for this chance for years, has set the moment up for perfection, and he will have his retribution if it is the last thing he does.

“You were a fool to think that you could instigate anything without my notice,” Red Skull says with his usual lazy enunciation. “Did you think that I would overlook this? With Earth at my feet and no more need for you and your comrade?” He regards the Commander haughtily, literally looking down on him from the dark throne he sat upon.

Always the drama queen.

“It is a shame,” he continues after a long silence. “I would have been willing to let you free, after so many years of service.”

The lie washes over the Commander like so much rainwater on a dreary reconnaissance mission. Annoying, but neither harmful nor a hindrance to him. He knows as well as the next person that he and the Winter Soldier would have been shoved into cryogenic pods again for the next time Hydra needed them. The cause requires extensive effort to keep the people under control, to the keep the world in order as Hydra wants it to be, and there will always be uses for super soldiers.

A side door swings open. The Winter Soldier walks forward, muzzle gone and hands chained together in front of him. A Hydra agent follows close behind with one of their more generic rifles. Once brought between the Commander and Red Skull, the Asset goes down on his knees at a barked command. The rifle is pointed at the back of his head.

“And now,” Schmidt says, almost a croon, “Your friend will pay the price for your insolence.”

There’s a single beat, a breath of air.

The agent glances sideways, just a flicker of motion, but it’s enough. Their eyes connect.

And the Commander nods.

The agent lifts his gun, shooting both of the guards watching over the room’s entrance. In the same instant, the Commander has whipped around to strangle the agent supposedly keeping him in check, before decidedly snapping the woman’s neck. Through it all, the containment chip on his neck fails to deliver the intended shocks for the insubordination – a good sign. At least the followers he’d set to invade the controller rooms have appeared to be successful on their end.

Red Skull immediately makes for his gun, but it’s a decorative one, with a very limited number of ammo. A shot rings out and connects with the ceiling as the Winter Soldier grabs his arm. He twists it painfully around Red Skull’s back, trying to kick him behind the knees when suddenly the man does a _flip_ and neatly takes the Winter Soldier down from behind.

Not bad for a disfigured nonagenarian. If only the serum hadn’t melted his face off, it really would have been perfect.

The Commander rushes him, tackling him off to the side while the agent stays a relatively safe distance away. He’d already warned everyone earlier and repeatedly over the course of the past few days that the Red Skull is _his_.

It’s been a while since Red Skull has had to personally go hand to hand with someone, especially against someone of the Commander’s combined strength and skill level, and it shows. Grappling with him and pinning him down isn’t _easy_ , by any means, but the knife driven neatly into his side definitely helps. Schmidt howls like the depraved animal he is, frothing at the mouth as his movements grow erratic. He shouts, but rarely has anything he ever said actually held any meaning, and the Commander ignores them to focus on driving his fist repeatedly into his face.

The Commander hits him and feels bones give way. He hits him and feels the blood soaking into his fingerless gloves. He hits the man who’s taking everything he ever loved away from him and tainted the tatters that remained, and lives for it.

Then – silence.

His breaths come in heavy even as he continues to lean over the ruined face, beaten in and unrecognizable as anything human. There’s blood and brain matter on his knuckles, his uniform, his face.

Inhale. Exhale. Repeat.

He stands. When the Commander turns, he sees his followers, his men have come into the room, and from the little he can see out into the hallway, there is bloody carnage. Everyone’s eyes are on him.

He licks his lips. Something tickles at the back of his mind. Flashes. Girls dressed in American flag colors; the sketch of a performing primate.

He shakes the images away.

“It is done,” the Commander’s voice rasps. The damage to his vocal cords will never fully heal, and he forces the words out of his mouth. “The Red Skull may have strayed away from Hydra’s true purpose for his own goals, but no longer. No longer will we stand for the chaos and impurity of the world. No longer will we follow the words of a madman.

“Today … today, we have triumphed over the old regime. Today, we stand united for the betterment of all mankind. We will shape the world into what it was always meant to be. We will have peace; we will have order.” He breathes in deep. “ _Hail Hydra_!”

As one, his followers respond.

“Hail Hydra!”

,

James Buchanan Barnes was a good man.

The Commander knows this, has etched the very fact into his heart, and knows that Barnes has no place here anymore. Steve and Bucky died a week apart from each other; one from a great fall, the other in a plane crashing into the cold sea. Now, there is the Commander and his Asset, and after all this pain, after all his sacrifice, he cannot allow the one important thing left in his life to walk away.

It is helpful, then, that the Asset only ever disobeys or unnecessarily bends the rules when Barnes is beginning to rise again.

A good man would never join Hydra. A good man wouldn’t understand the changes the Commander has made to it, that method of God as he uses evil to accomplish good in the world.

He sees Barnes’ fear when the Winter Soldier forces himself not to tremble in the chair. His hands and legs are bound to it in the customary fashion. The gag is shiny and new, something that won’t make his jaw ache after everything is over and done with. There’s no point in needless cruelty.

The only thing he has left flinches minutely when he brings his hand up to gently cup that familiar face.

He can’t lose the Winter Soldier. Not now, not even to Barnes.

“You let the rebels get away,” the Commander says quietly. There’s a glimmer of tears in the Asset’s eyes. “ _Again_. When I know you could have caught them.”

The soldier makes a small sound through the gag. Something like _please_.

 _Your subordinates’ mission report was … revealing. Care to tell me why you_ let _them go? You know how important this is to us._

 _They were_ kids _, Stevie._

He sighs and shakes his head. “I wish you didn’t make me do this to you. Do you think it makes me happy? Do you think I like seeing you in pain? I would give you anything, I’ve sacrificed everything for you…” Lightly, he traces the Asset’s bottom lip with his thumb while his free hand guides the machinery to fit snugly on his head. Whispers, “Why can’t you just be _good_?”

The Commander makes his way over to the consoles. He flips the switches with a practiced familiarity, listens to the thrum of the machinery as it comes to life.

The Winter Soldier screams into the gag, jerks uselessly in the chair. The excruciating pain twists his face as the tears flow freely. The Commander is under no illusions that this might need to be repeated once or twice before it really takes, but he’s sure the lesson will sink in. He finds he’s much more lax with the Asset than any of his handlers ever used to be, but there are behaviors he will not tolerate – especially not the ones that could turn into habit.

Bucky died because of Steve; Steve died because of Bucky. They’re both dead men walking, and there’s nothing left except each other.

He takes the Asset’s twitching, spasming face into his hands and holds him still as he licks the tears carefully. He tastes the salt water, can practically smell his pain.

“I love you,” he breathes. And he does. Despite everything Hydra made them into, a part of them will always be made to give and love, and he does love his Asset so.

If only James Barnes would die.

He jerks awake, the desolate cries of a babe still echoing in his mind. Ice creeps from his bones into his veins and makes its way outwards to the steady beat of his heart. The Commander turns his head and sees the empty expanse of the mattress stretched out before him. His ears strain to pick up a sleepily murmured _daddy_ even though he is alone – was alone – will always be alone, now.

These are the bad days.

Consciousness filters in slowly, hazily, buttery and warm against the chill inside, not unlike sunlight in the early morning. For a few precious heartbeats, he drifts between dreams and reality where his hands and shield aren’t covered in blood. For a few stolen seconds in time, he is happy.

When he wakes up, he is still alone.

Those days are bittersweet.

The Commander never recalls a time when Steve Rogers ever thought about wanting to rule nations, and he finds the job distasteful now. The kid from Brooklyn just wanted to perform his duty as a citizen, as an individual in a nation involved in a war against those who would oppress. Captain America and Captain Hydra were forces to be directed at the enemy – they were meant to defend their respective causes, whether it aligned with SHIELD or Hydra, or follow their own moral compass if need be. The Commander just wanted Schmidt dead, and for Hydra to become what it was always meant to be, without the leadership of a madman.

For his sacrifice to be worth something.

The possibility that none of it meant anything briefly flits through his mind. Beyond it, insanity lies, grinning toothily back at him.

He keeps the Asset close by on those days, rumors be damned. As long as they’re not planning a revolution, the lower ranks can say whatever they want so long as they keep it out of earshot.

It’s a bittersweet day when Thanos arrives, and the Commander can recognize another impending upheaval in his life. He’s familiar with the signs by now. At the very least, this will not result in a 70-year nap.

Probably.

They fight. They lose.

Half of the universe’s population dissolves into ash.

It’s an unexpectedly quiet thing, for the end of the world. There is no fanfare, no deafening explosion. Just a breath, the snap of a gauntlet – their muted death knell. Honestly, the Commander expected something more … colorful. Twitching bodies, mutilated corpses, agony etched into the half of the population that lost the cosmic coin toss. But, like so much else in his life, that’s not what he gets.

His legs collapse beneath him when the Asset appears in his line of sight. The Commander holds his face, his shoulders, his hands, reassuring himself that there is one thing that still makes sense.

It wasn’t all for nothing.

For a while, the world crumbles. It mourns. Then, it rebuilds.

The Commander is stretched thin more often than not, and he knows the Asset feels much the same way. They never wanted to be soldiers or leaders of the people. There had been a war, and they fought like any good, qualified – or, in Steve Rogers’ case, _unqualified_ – young men should.

Time and time again, the Commander has dragged the people away from large-scale conflicts. He refuses to participate in another world war, much less be at the head of it. Thanos, fool that he was, destroyed half of the animal population and plant life along with the people, which made his entire quest moot. Freely available food and clean water have been made possible by the technological advancements put forward by what remains of Stark Industries, but that only goes so far when one’s loved ones have disappeared in the blink of an eye without any real sense or reason.

For years, the grief and rage that followed was the Commander’s enemy, as civilian populations pointed fingers. Mass suicides abounded in the months following the Snap, and there was nothing that could be done for it. First responders and hospitals were dangerously understaffed, and the few that remained were severely overworked. After some time, it was just … easier to let those who wanted to leave, leave.

The Commander doesn’t like thinking about it. If he thinks about it too much, his head invariably starts hurting as his blood pressure builds and he wonders just _why_ he hadn’t been able to completely demolish the universe’s biggest dumbass.

“He’s the idiot with a bigger stick,” the Asset shrugs after another one of the Commander’s enraged rants. “The biggest stick. It’s a wonder no one else ever thought of using the stone before, really.”

He was never a very good person to rant to about these things.

Time passes, and there are days when the Commander swears he can see James Barnes in the man – less in the form of punishable acts of rebellion, now replaced by the world-weariness of someone who’s seen and lived through too much to be bothered by anything anymore – and wonders what that means for himself.

The rebels have grown desperate. They have to be, to try and reach out to theoretical other dimensions for otherworldly help.

It’s one of the few missions the Commander deigns to attend anymore, along with his elite team and the Asset. The less people who know about this, the better. Never mind if their device works, it’s the idea he wants to quell before it can get too popular.

Some doors are better left closed.

What happens next is a blur even for his mind. He remembers fighting, the flow of movements to an unheard beat, action and reaction as the Commander breaks bones and fires off shots from his sidearm. There’s blood on the floor, on his costume, splattered and drying on his bare face.

He dares them to kill him. God knows, Erskine’s serum will keep him alive and strong until then.

They’re weak, though, and he kills them for it.

They’re weak, and he tears through their ranks with all the careless abandon of a raging forest fire.

And there, in one of the labs, is the … the _thing_. The contraption that should have retrieved their precious help. It’s an ugly machine, all steel and angles. Even without a platform, it stands taller than a man and its interior large enough to fit a car. The lights on the control panels are on, an unsettling hum raising goosebumps along his skin.

“Asset! Find a way to turn it off.” The Commander strides towards the control panels, but then–

But then–

A shadowy figure jumps out of the vents, and tries wrangling the Commander to the ground. He manages to throw his assailant off, but is tripped up in the process. Belatedly, he recognizes the leather and purples accents.

He wonders if Natasha taught him how to trip people like that. It looks complicated. Precise.

The Commander falls, but before he can hit the ground, the machine starts pulling him in.

“Commander!”

“Soldier, cut the power!”

“Rot in hell,” Clint Barton snarls right as he kicks the Commander in the solar plexus. The pain that jolts his already bruised ribs blind him for only a second, but it’s long enough. A bright light flashes so harshly he can almost swear it’s sears his eyes.

The Commander falls.

Right into the snow.

In a way, Barton got his wish.

The Commander blinks away phantom images from his eyes. The wintry landscape that surrounds him is new and unwelcome, but the building nearby has a familiar architecture reminiscent of some of Hydra’s older bases.

The sounds of battle rage inside, and he approaches the structure with caution. He doesn’t know if the device actually works or if it just managed to transport him elsewhere – possibly one of the worst kinds of elsewhere, but it _seems_ like he’s still on Earth – and a quick test confirms that his communications network is down.

Fuck, what if the thing actually managed to send him to another world? What if it sent him forward in time?

A shiver works its way down the Commander’s spine as he takes his gun in hand. The doors to the building are unlocked, and he slowly makes his way over to where the sounds echo the loudest. For a second, he thinks he hears a repulsor blast. But that technology … no… That technology died with its creator. He made sure of it.

The clang of metal and bodies being thrown around draws him ever closer like a moth to a flame. The sight that greets the Commander, however, draws out the ugliest of roars from his torn vocal cords.

It’s the nightmare that visits every time he closes his eyes. The one that he lived and relives every night when his eyes close.

Tony is on the floor in the armor, helmet off, unable to move, and there – there is Captain America sitting atop him, shield raised high. Somewhere off to the side is the Asset, pathetic and useless and broken like he always is. Too weak to be anything more than shadow of a person.

Instinct drives him forward, making him wild as he knocks Captain America off the fallen man in the red armor. Acid burns through his veins and narrows his vision. Memories blind him as he fights, the comforting familiarity of bodies in motion, of movement and fighting to hurt, to kill, as natural as despair. He remembers Tony begging him for help, Tony pinned underneath him, Tony _dead_ , Tony lying still on the ground.

_Daddy … please…_

A strong hand grabs his forearm, hauling him off Captain America and throwing him backwards.

It’s the Asset. His metal arm is missing – it looks like it’s been blasted off – and when he gets a good look at the Commander’s face, he _hesitates_ like the fool he is. It’s almost too easy to grab him by the neck, to slam him headfirst into the concrete. To grab his hair and smash his face into the ground once more for good measure.

He hopes his skull cracks.

“ _Bucky_!”

Captain America is up again, and the Commander would like nothing more than to take out his gun and shoot him in the face. Instead, he sidesteps the Captain before catching him in the stomach with his fist.

The fight, whenever he cares to think back on it, isn’t entirely fair. Both Captain America and his Asset – _Bucky_ – are already tired and injured; hell, Bucky’s entire _arm_ has been blasted off. But Tony lies still and silent on the ground, encased in his armor, and the Commander never cared about _fair_ anyway.

Kneeing Captain America in the face is the very definition of catharsis. The Commander tears the helmet off, snarling at Steve Rogers’ face, at _his_ face, and throws him into the wall, impacting the ugly concrete. Rogers crumples to the floor, trying and failing to stand again until the Commander pins him down, reaches for his neck, and _squeezes_.

The device may have dragged him to hell, but if he can’t have Tony, then he can at least have this.

Rogers’ eyes are wide, lips open as he tries to struggle, to gasp for air, but the Commander’s grip is unyielding.

Movement. A glint of light in the corner of his eye, and the Commander looks up, more than ready to throw hands again with the – with Bucky–

But it’s not Bucky. It’s Tony. Tony with a profusely bleeding cut hidden somewhere above his hairline. The blood crawls down his face in rivers of bright red. There are heavy bags under his eyes, a cut on his cheek, and wrinkles.

Tony is…

Alive.

Alive?

 _Alive_.

And dragging the damaged armor across the ground, almost crawling in his effort to reach them. The reactor in his chest is still dead, still broken, so Tony should be dead, too, but … he’s _not_ , and maybe yes, maybe this _is_ hell, maybe that’s just how things go around here, and yet – and _yet_ –

“Look, I don’t know what cryo tube Zemo pulled _you_ out of, but–”

“Tony,” Rogers slurs. “No…”

The Commander headbutts him, effectively knocking the man out for the moment. He makes no other move, however, as he watches Tony struggle to approach them. Encased in all that technology … it must be heavy with all of its systems offline.

“Get away from him,” Tony growls, voice strained from exertion. “Get the _fuck_ –” he wheezes “– _away_.”

The Commander merely tilts his head. Curious awe quickly turns to horror when he realizes it’s blood that’s making Tony’s lips so red. Blood that’s started to crawl out of the edges of his mouth as he keeps coughing and crawling towards them, to accomplish a goal that escapes the Commander’s imagination.

Then, Tony collapses.

The Commander scrambles off Rogers in an ungainly manner even as he reaches for him. And it’s horrifyingly too much like being _Steve_ again – it’s the fear, he thinks. The way his heart speeds up as _what if, what if_ runs through his head.

Tony collapses, and the Commander gathers him into his arms, cradling him gently.

“Baby,” the Commander rasps. “Baby boy, no… Look at me, look at daddy.”

“Jesus fucking Christ, you’re insane,” Tony mutters between gasps, but his eyes do open at his plea. “I’m not – you’re not – _fuck_.”

“You’re gonna be okay, baby,” the Commander breathes, holding him close. Because he can’t do this again, he can’t _lose Tony_ again. Not again, never again. Not because of Bucky or the Asset or Steve fucking Rogers or anyone or anything else. “I’m gonna take care of you this time, okay? You’re gonna be okay.”

Tony chokes on his blood.

“What is going on here?”

A new voice rings out not too far away, and the Commander spares a moment to look up at the new arrival. Amazingly, it is the Black Panther. The Commander arranged for the pesky youth’s death some time ago and seeing him now after so many years is jarring.

Not that it matters. They’ve already wasted too much time.

Quickly, deftly, the Commander rises carefully with Tony in his arms, more than ready to make a break for it. Never mind the loose ends he’ll leave behind, or the world outside he doesn’t know the first thing about.

Tony is alive.

His baby is alive.

A familiar hum makes its way to his ears. In the corner of his vision, the Commander can see the portal worming its way into this reality – whatever this place is, really – and he braces himself.

Black Panther steps forward. “Put Iron Man down.”

He sends the prince an ugly grin. Captain America had almost killed Tony, and they expect him to – what, _leave_ him here? To die?

“He is mine.”

The prince’s eyes narrow. “And what claim could you have on this man?”

The flood rises and static fills his ears. Metal whines and gives way as the Commander’s grip on the Iron Man suit tightens. His eyes narrow.

This … _child_.

He would never understand the grief of a parent. Of a Caregiver for his Little. The ghost that would never disappear, the voice he would never stop looking for, the love that could never be right with anyone else.

The portal home – at least, the Commander is willing to assume that’s what it is, but he’ll keep Tony safe either way – grows, and he starts edging towards it. In his arms, Tony squirms as much as he can within the dead armor, trying and failing to speak as blood floods his mouth. Across the room, he can hear Bucky and Captain America stirring.

For a moment, he thinks about replying to the prince’s question. But he is not important, and Tony needs medical attention.

He leaps into the portal just as Black Panther lunges for him.


End file.
